Page 21 of Boy Friends
Same here, Safa. I’m convinced Simo just made it up to annoy her. Prompted by the disapproval in her voice, he digs in deeper. ‘I need to live there at least for a bit if I want to be fluent. And I do want to be fluent. It’s embarrassing that I could barely talk with my own cousins. So, yeah, I’m doing a gap year.’
He’s riling her up. And it seems to be working, because now I know where he has that forehead vein from. Its twin is appearing on Safa’s brow. Simo doesn’t usually talk back at them, at least not when I’m around. Also, he’s stretching the truth more than a bit. He soaked up his dad’s language like a sponge, and by the end of the holiday he held entire conversations with his family. Not to mention that his cousins’ English was so flawless I never dared to use the Spanish sentences I’d prepared in order not to look completely ignorant. I failed at that, obviously. But my Duolingo streak is uninterrupted ever since.
‘We didn’t save money for university only for you to waste it on a party trip to Spain. Gap years are for rich kids.’ Her words are sharp and precise. I see her glance my way for a second, but her anger overrides her sense of propriety. I try to disappear behind the vase of daisies, uncomfortably aware of my presence in this home that isn’t mine.
Simo keeps quiet for the rest of the meal, which doesn’t last long. The Lorcas have lost their appetites, and as soon as we’ve cleared the table, Simo pulls me back into his room. I decide it’s better to keep quiet than to appear like I’magreeing with his mum. Best to resent our parents together than resent each other.
Simo straddles his desk chair and disappears into his phone, and since I prefer mine in its dead state, I fall back on to the bed and stare at the ceiling. I could make a start on the assigned reading, but books never take my mind off things. When my thoughts become too loud, I bake, but I can’t exactly do that in the Lorcas’ kitchen and my own is currently enemy territory. It’s easy to empty my head when I focus on following the steps of a recipe. There’s something calming about throwing ingredients together, mixing them with my own two hands. It’s hard to feel bad about life when you’ve created something that’s pretty to look at and makes your mouth water.
‘Would you be mad at me if I brought up your grandmother?’ Simo says, bursting the daydream. He lifts his shoulders, as if he’s trying to brace himself for my reaction. But the truth is, he would have to commit a serious crime for me to get angry with him. And even then, I’d still help him cover it up. ‘It’s just, I have intel on her that you might want to hear.’
‘But you don’t even know her.’ I prop myself up, confusion rushing through my veins.
‘No, but it turns out Dad does. When I mentioned your, um, falling-out, he kind of connected the dots. He’s one of only two estate agents in town, and when a property like Hidden House sells, it doesn’t go unnoticed.’
I’m trying to digest the fact that he’s sat on this information all through breakfast. I know he’s only trying to protect me, but I’m starting to feel stupid for being left inthe dark while Simo, his dad and likely his mum too know more about my grandmother than I do.
‘Don’t make me drag it out of you!’
‘I’m sorry! I’m trying to help, even if I’m doing a bad job at it. I’m hardly an expert at diffusing family drama.’ He gets up and sits next to me on the bed. ‘Ready?’
I close my eyes and focus on his leg touching mine. When the nagging impatience has subsided, I face him again. He is serious and beautiful. The confident arcs of his eyebrows, the way his freckles mingle with the pockmarks, the soft upswing of his nose. If baking offers moments of escape, Simo anchors me in the present.
‘OK. Tell me.’
He hesitates, then he holds out his phone. I take it, but he doesn’t let go. We’re both holding on to it, and maybe to each other.
Several versions of her look up at me; photographs from galas and functions. ‘Secret CEO: The Female Face of the Brandenburg Brand’ beneath a picture that shows her cutting a ribbon with oversized scissors, ‘Thirteen Women in Power Suits’ reads another, next to ‘Brandenburg Christmas Gala Turns Twenty’. There are a whole bunch more, on fiscal years, business growth, and bagels, of all things. She’s younger in most of them, but the haircut is the same, the long fringe framing a heart-shaped face. And always by her side a man who, at first sight, I believe to be Dad. It’s the same face, down to the dip in the chin and wavy hair. The real difference lies in his expression. Where Dad’s eyes hold warmth, this older version of him looks on to the world with cold calculation.
CHAPTER 10 – SIMO
‘How much money can you make frombread?’
‘Enough to buy an ancient mansion,’ Mairi tells Louise, and bites off the tip of her carrot. They’re scrolling through articles and Wikipedia entries on their phones, researching Lombard’s newest residents.
Louise is doing what she does best, spreading gossip and adding a trickle of fuel to keep the fire going. People are already losing their minds over the mere presence of multimillionaires in Lombard, I can’t imagine their reaction when they find out whose grandparents they are.
‘The mansion isn’t that ancient, only three or four centuries,’ she says, and twirls a strawberry-blonde curl around her finger.
‘You try and make it to three hundred years and then we’ll talk about what is and isn’t ancient,’ Mairi deadpans.
Louise stares at her phone, mouth agape. ‘If these sources are correct, the Brandenburgs are so rich they could buy the whole town,’ she tells us. ‘All because they somehow turned a single bakery into a multimillion-pound bread empire.’
‘I get it,’ Jacob chirps up. ‘I love bread.’
A group of us have swapped the packed lunch hall for the park. We’re huddled on the stage of the open-air theatre, which is shaped like a giant oyster, its curved roof offering shelter from the constant drizzle. Despite that, everyone’s in shorts and T-shirts, trying to make the summer last.
My gaze sweeps across the tended lawns and flower beds and keeps snagging on the town square – and the noticeboard – just beyond the park, separated only by a concrete patch of street. My chest flares with anxiety every time I read the words, even though the message has long changed.
JOIN THE HARVEST
FESTIVAL
THIS WEEKEND!
Next to me, Luca is biting his fingernails. I elbow him, because there is no sound I find more revolting, and he knows it. When I nod towards the steps, silently asking if he wants to leave, he shakes his head.
I’m surprised we’re still here, listening to gossip about his grandparents, after we spent the weekend scouring the internet for information, and even watched a documentary on the bread empire in question. It was Luca’s grandfather who turned the ailing family bakery around, buying up other bakeries that were close to ruin and, over the next four decades, amassing hundreds of stores all over thecountry. Nowadays, Brandenburg bread is sold in every supermarket and cafe. All these years we’ve been munching on Brandenburg toast without knowing that it’s Luca’s grandparents’ name on the packaging. He stares at his half-eaten sandwich as if he just had the same thought.
